The celebration of Ariel's awakening took the manor by storm. At breakfast Adui and his family had lamb, and by the night time, Arnold, the patriarch of the family himself went and hunted a deer. Everyone was excited about this achievement, more so was Ariel herself.
The whole night she kept saying, "I will become a great mana wielder, spread the name of the Hampshire family all around the world." And everyone nodded to her claims as if she would really achieve it.
At one point in time, it got a little bit annoying as well. That girl has just stepped into the world of mana wielders, and she thinks that she could surpass everyone. If only he could burst his bubble.
In the world of mana wielders, there are many Mana Arts. But majorly one could divide these arts into two types. First is the warrior kind, people like Adui, who could wield mana, and store it, but dont have mana heart. This organ is present in the second type of Mana Arts user. He was not able to find the reason, or the usage of mana heart. Most of the books in the study room were about ancient warriors and their feats.
But from what he knew, Mana art users with mana hearts are stronger than people without one. And Ariel on the other hand doesn't have a mana heart. So what was giving her this confidence was beyond him…
"So does that mean I can come with you to the ball?" Ariel asked his father, who looked surprised by the question.
"Of course my dear, you can," Adui's mother spoke quickly. This prompted her to receive a glare from his father, which Areil noticed.
"Wait, are you saying that I cannot come?" she asked.
"Well.." His father hesitated, "Dear we have to buy you a dress for the event. I dont know whether we would be able to find one for you, within a week."
"And you dont wanna look ugly in front of everyone now, do you?" Luthor commented as well.
"Father you promised that I would be able to accompany you to the ball if I got awakened," Ariel protested, "Now you are going back on your words?"
"But dear, understand that predicament here," his father leaned forward and spoke in a soft tone, "We dont have anything that you could wear for the event."
"I dont care," Ariel declared, "I will be going to the event. You are gonna find me a dress, I dont know how."
His father sighed, and turned to him, "Oye Hubert!" he yelled. Surprised to hear his name, he looked at his father, "If we are to buy her a dress, how much money do you reckon that we would be able to spare?"
"Umm.." Hubert thought for a bit, and then answered, "I think around 20 gold coins sire, if we were to stretch the budget thin,"
"That would be enough… I think," his father mumbled, "But that won't be enough for jewelry,"
And then started the commotion once again, Areil started throwing tantrums and Arnold tried to quell his daughter's tantrums. Adui thought that this might be a good time to be a hero. Usually, he would stay quiet during a time like this, but getting brownie points from his sister could help him in his future plans.
"Father," he said, but no one heard him. He then raised his voice once again, "Father!" everyone quieted down and looked at him. He then continued, "We can spare some money from the emergency fund that you told me to build. With that we could spare 10 gold coins, bringing the total up to thirty,"
Ariel's eyes widened with surprise, "We can do that?" she asked his father.
"What emergency fund?" his father asked him.
"You said that tough times are around us, we need to prepare for the worst. So I prepared for the worst, I made the emergency fund," he said. The truth was that he made this fund for him. As he had been keeping books and managing the household expenses, he was able to save a lot of money. And his father did say those exact words. He figured that if he were to get caught in the future he could use those words to get out of trouble. As he was an idiot in front of everyone, they would think that he truly believed his father's words and created such an account.
"Are telling the truth boy?" his father asked him with a serious tone. To which he nodded, he had mentioned the emergency fund in the ledger as well, but his father never bothered to look at it properly.
With a big smile on his face, his father spoke, "Guess, you are going to the ball," and Ariel jumped with excitement…
That night when Adui was going to bed, he had a lot of things on his mind.
It has been a year since I came to this world. I have been shutting my monster down because I needed this family to grow. But that is not the case anymore. I need to move on.
He was done with the family. He read everything that this family could offer him, now he needs to move on. But the challenge was, that he had to move in such a way that he would be able to appease his hunger and rob this family blind. And for that to happen, he had the perfect plan. All he needed to have his father and his brother gone for the night. And luckily, that is going to happen in a week…
***
It was an emotional moment for the Hampshire Family. Ariel had come an age, and she was going on her first ball. Adui's mother and she had bought this revealing green dress for the girl, so that some noble would fall in love with her during the ball, and maybe she would be married off by the end of the year.
In this world, the customs of marriage are very different from Earth. Polygamy was a thing, and in this world, the mana wielders could grow their harem or spouses to whatever number they could sustain. As the mana wielder could be of any gender, the practices of patriarchy or matriarchy were prominent throughout the world. In Areil's case, she was not strong enough to have a harem of her own, but she could be part of someone else's.
Everyone believed that she would be able to snag a husband or wife in the event, which was why that morning was particularly sad. While Adui on the other hand was feeling a little bit down as well. His original target was going, now he had to appease his hunger for blood with the other fools of the family.
I will get him. Sooner or later, I will get that man. He swears to himself.
It was only after they were gone, that he got to work. He first went on with the day as he usually does. It is only when the sun was high up in the sky he went to Hubert, the man that who could make his plan successful.
In the past year, Hubert and him have developed a friendship. Usually, Hubert used to keep the ledger and handle the expenses of the household. But Adui's father never trusted the man, even though he had been practically living with them for ages. It is only when his own blood started taking care of things, that his father backed down from checking the ledger.
Hubert used to siphon some of the money for himself and had been doing so for many years. When he started taking care of the ledger, he came as a friend to see whether he could still siphon some money. That man tried to befriend him and treated him with utmost respect, and Adui behaved like a naive child and let him siphon some money. Since then Hubert has been very happy with him, and today he is going to use it to his advantage…
When Adui got to the kitchen, Hubert was with the maids preparing for lunch. "Hubert," the man looked behind and passed him a smile.
"Young master Adui," the man exclaimed, "Do you need something?"
"Can I talk to you? In private?" the maid looked at each other and passed each other a smile. They all knew what this was about, except for the man.
Hubert followed him out of the kitchen, and Adui let it out, "There… there.. Today is the festival of lights, in the Hummer Village,"
"Oh yeah," Hubert said, "What of it.."
"I was thinking of going there. I have never been to the festival, but all of my siblings have,"
"But young master," he said, "Are you sure that you would be able to handle the journey?"
"That is why was I thinking of taking Martha with me," Adui said while blushing, "Then I would be fine,"
Suddenly Hubert realized what was happening, and knowingly nodded, "Well, of course, young master.. You can take her. I can easily spare her for the day. Hell, I can spare her for two days, if you guys think of staying together." Adui then blushed even more and then ran out of there, making Hubert chuckle.
Adui's mother was easy to convince because she also understood that if they were gone, there was practically no one in the whole house. And she and Hubert could have their own fun. As far as Adui's small siblings were concerned, there was nothing that sleeping herbs couldnt help with. He knows for a fact that Hubert had used the herbs on the smaller siblings from time to time from the courtesy of Martha.
As soon as they had their lunch, Adui along with Martha set out to Hummer Village, located around 10km away from their manor. They reached the place by sundown when the festival finally started taking place.
While holding hands they lit various candles all around the village, bought a few things from the merchants, eat different variety of things from stalls that were put up for the festival. And they ended the day with tea. While Adui liked his tea with milk, he made sure that Martha's tea was laced with sleeping herbs.
After drinking the tea, Martha started eyeing him like a hungry tiger. She wanted to pounce at him, he could feel that. Unfortunately for her, it was during this time the herb kicked in, and she started feeling sleepy. So they to an inn, to spend the night. While Martha slept peacefully that night, Adui sneaked out of the inn at midnight, without being seen by anyone…